The bishop of Johannesburg, spiritual father to both white and black Anglicans in South Africa’s largest city, has campaigned relentlessly at home and abroad against the apartheid system. He has become a symbol to the world of the struggle of black people in that country.
Bishop Desmond Tutu
“Let us pray first,” said Bishop Desmond Tutu before starting this interview with South African journalist Stovin Hayter. And he proceeded to ask God’s guidance and help that only the truth might be spoken.
But, as always, the truth is in the eye of the beholder — and much of what the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize winner has to say is hotly disputed by critics inside and outside his beleaguered nation.
To many white South Africans, however, he is a man bent on destroying their land. They make the point that the bishop is actually proof that dissent and opposition are tolerated in South Africa — as opposed to many of the other countries whose attacks on South Africa have made her a pariah nation. And even within the black community there, many regard him as naive and ineffective.
Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi, leader of the Zulu nation, for example, has criticized those like Bishop Tutu who call for other nations to apply economic sanctions against South Africa by “disinvesting” their assets in that country. In the December 1985 issue of Penthouse, Buthelezi asserted: “Disinvestment in South Africa is counterproductive, because if the economic situation of black people is worsened, it doesn’t resolve the problems.”
And in the United States, while many students and others regard Bishop Tutu as a hero, he is not without critics. Patrick Buchanan, who is now President Reagan’s chief media adviser, has charged that “whatever his moral splendor, the Bishop is a political ignoramus. Should the Soviet-backed terrorists of the African National Congress [which has been publicly embraced by Tutu] ever seize power in South Africa, the bishop, if he is still alive, would likely enjoy the same accommodations his colleague, Bishop [Abel] Muzorewa, enjoys in ‘liberated’ Rhodesia: preventive detention.”
Other Americans have also found the bishop’s view of international affairs puzzling, to say the least. In late 1984, for example, he stunned many observers when he called on a Jewish audience in the United States to pressure Israel to join a boycott of South Africa. Referring to the murder of Palestinians by Christian Phalangists in Lebanon, Bishop Tutu caused his audience to gasp when he said: “After Israel connived in the killing of the Arabs by the gentiles … more than a half-million Israelis demonstrated against the actions of their own government.”
But the bishop ref uses to acknowledge any contradictions or mistakes and regards his disinvestment campaign, and international economic pressure on South Africa generally, as the last resort of a people deprived of every other means of bringing an end to the system they suffer under.
One tragic fact that everyone — black and white — agrees on is that the growing violence must be halted. South Africa has reeled under almost daily killings (over 1,000 people have died since September 1984), and Bishop Tutu has often spoken out against the violence on both sides. After a series of horrific burnings of suspected police informers, for example, he threatened to “collect my bags and leave this country that I love” if it happened again. “I am going to find it difficult to speak up for your liberation,” he told a crowd of several thousand near Johannesburg.
Hayter interviewed the bishop in his office, and by telephone, late last year. The interview was subsequently purchased by Penthouse. Only days before, Bishop Tutu had told the United Nations that South Africa should be made to face global punitive sanctions unless radical changes were underway with in six months. There were four areas in which he said that the South African government could show that it meant business: abolish the migrant-labor system; allow the unionization of black workers; abandon the influx-control system, which determines which blacks may live in the cities and the conditions under which they may do so; and invest significant amounts of money in black education.
But his main target, of course, is apartheid itself. He is adamant that this racial-separation system is at the root of the vicious cycle of violence and that it will have to be abandoned before there is any chance of real peace.
“I have no political ambitions. I’m my own master, except that I owe allegiance to Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.… We can’t talk about peaceful change in South Africa. I talk about reasonably peaceful changes.”
Just to set the scene, what is black life like in South Africa?
Tutu: Well, basically a life of deprivation, of being deprived access to all kinds of things, deprived access to the decision-making processes of the country and, consequently, you always end up getting the rough end of the deal, the thin end of the stick.
Can you be more specific?
Tutu: For instance, in terms of land resources, the blacks — who form the vast majority of this country, 80 percent of the population — have 13 percent of the land, and the 20 percent who are white and have political power, which gives access to all other kinds of power, have 87 percent of the land. You are told where to live, and you live in a ghetto. It hasn’t got streetlights, usually, or all the other amenities that people take for granted in a well-planned suburb of Johannesburg streetlights, tarred roads, pavements, electricity, water-borne sewerage, public libraries, cinemas, swimming pools. All those things people take for granted, they don’t have.
What other ways are blacks getting the “thin end of the stick” in white-ruled South Africa?
Tutu: They pass laws that only apply to blacks. They control rigidly the movement of blacks, where you can be and where you can’t be and how long you can be where you are told where to be. The kind of schools you send your children to, the kind of education your children get, which is an education on which the government spends an eighth of what it spends on the education of a white child. Black men are also expected to leave their wives and children in rural areas and come to work in towns as migrant workers, where they live in single-sex hostels. One could go on giving a catalogue, but it boils down to the fact that you are treated as less than human.
Are things getting better or worse at the moment?
Tutu: Things are much worse, much, much worse. In the past we were regarded as citizens of this country and it was an undivided South Africa. Even if we were citizens only in name — and what is a citizen if he does not have political power? — we were South African citizens, and whenever you got a passport you were described as a South African. Then the government came along with its policy of the Bantustans, balkanizing South Africa into ten or so of these unviable monstrosities, the spawnings of race bigotry really gone mad.
Why have you called it apartheid’s “final solution”?
Tutu: Because that was what gave rise to the horrendous policy of forced population removals, ending up with three million people being moved from their homes. Stable communities were deliberately destroyed, and people were moved and then “dumped.” That is a word you don’t use with human beings. You dump rubbish, you dump things, and this is precisely what was happening. Children were placed in situations where you knew they were going to starve. And the father would have to leave his wife and children eking out their miserable existence. We were being denationalized, turned into aliens in our own land.
Aren’t certain things getting better?
Tutu: How can you say anything is getting better? They talk about reforms, and what do they do? They deal with little things that are of no consequence.
For example?
Tutu: They will say: “Oh yes, we will now repeal out of the kindness of our hearts the Mixed Marriages and Immorality acts,” that portion of it which makes sexual relations between whites and non-whites a crime. They expect us to go on the rooftops and sing hurrahs. But who passed the law in the first place? What really has changed? Bantu education remains firmly in place, which the children are boycotting because they are opposed to inferior education. We have a new constitution, but it was set up to exclude 73 percent of the population of the country. How can you say anything is getting better?
What would be something that mattered?
Tutu: The Population Registration Act, which has caused so much anguish. I mean, you have had child suicides. They have said they will not change the group areas, that blacks must remain in their ghettos and whites remain in their affluent ghettos. They have done nothing about the things that matter — political power. They want us to sit around waiting for the crumbs the master, out of his generosity, is willing to throw us.
What are the political changes necessary for you to say apartheid has ended?
Tutu: Basically, it is being treated as a citizen. As a citizen I must be free to move freely in the land of my birth. Pass laws, influx control, discriminatory education must go. I must be free to live where I want to live. Group areas must go.
Is the present government capable of doing this?
Tutu: I operate on the basis that everybody is a saint until proven contrary. I still believe that they have enough intelligence in their heads to realize that their best interests are served when there is justice.
Do you think that President P. W. Botha is sincere when he says that he wants change?
Tutu: I assume that a person is a gentleman, and therefore I take him at his word. But anyone with power — it has nothing to do with color — will do all he can to retain that power. The thing is how they retain power. They retain it at the expense of the humanity of other people.
Do you believe that we are seeing the beginning of a civil war, with the Army occupying townships and daily violence?
Tutu: The civil war started long ago. We have South African fighting South African. It is a civil war of low intensity. What is frightening is the possibility of it escalating into full-scale bloody strife.
Are black people so angry that they will soon reject nonviolent leaders like yourself?
Tutu: Oh, but that is obvious. You remain a leader as long as you have the confidence of the people, and usually it is because you are delivering the goods, or they think you have the capacity to deliver the goods. But as time goes by you jettison a leader who doesn’t deliver. My own surprise is to discover that they still accept our leadership when we have nothing to show for our nonviolence.
Is peaceful change still possible?
Tutu: Well, we are in the business of trying to insure that the level of violence and bloodshed is kept as low as possible. We can’t talk about peaceful change. I talk about reasonably peaceful changes. The South African situation is violent and the primary violence is the violence of apartheid. I would say, however, there is an outside chance of bringing significant change peacefully.
Since you were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, you are perceived around the world as the chief peacemaker in South Africa. How do you feel about that role?
Tutu: It is an awesome responsibility. You find that you are moving against the current a great deal and end up being caught between two forces, those who think you are too moderate and those who think you are too radical. So you end up being chewed up.
Your opponents say a priest should stay out of politics. What do you say to them?
Tutu: That is only said by people who benefit by an unjust dispensation. Do you ever hear victims anywhere in the world say that?
Why have you asked the United Nations to pursue a policy of disinvestment in South Africa?
Tutu: There are three ways you can change a political situation you don’t like: You can vote the people out of power, but blacks can’t do that because they can’t vote. You can overthrow it violently, but we are trying not to do so. And you can use peaceful ways and strategies instead of violence, and we call on the international community to help us with a peace! ul strategy to persuade the government that it is time they went to the conference table.
Many whites believe that you want total economic war declared on the country. What is your reaction?
Tutu: It’s up to them. You are saying that we don’t need to have sanctions. but we must bring changes. We can’t sit around and have our three-year-olds killed by the police while people expect us to have equanimity. We can’t sit around and have other people decide for us where we should live. I don’t want to see this country destroyed and could have long ago called for sanctions. We went to the government five years ago, pleading — if you do one, two, three, four, I will be the first to say give government a chance. They thought they could ride it out because the international community was dragging its heels, as it still does. Mr. Reagan, Mr. Kohl. Mrs. Thatcher are Botha’s greatest allies. He knows that they will protect him from his vicious policies.
Are blacks aware that they may suffer the most with disinvestment?
Tutu: They believe that. They were asked, “Do you know you will lose jobs?” They have answered by saying that if that is how we are going to bring change in this country, what is the point of being a slave in paradise? White people think we have such a wonderful time. Would they change places with us?
Do you think the struggle of black people in South Africa is comparable to the civil rights struggle of black Americans?
Tutu: There are certain similar features that make it comparable: People are discriminated against on the basis of color, becoming victims of injustice, oppression, and exploitation. Blacks in both countries have generally used nonviolent methods to fight this, and the ministry has played a significant role in the leadership of the struggle. But there is a very important difference. In America blacks were claiming rights that were guaranteed to them under the Constitution. The law of the land was on their side. Here the constitution is against us, and what we are struggling for are fundamental human rights.
Have American whites acted differently from their South African counterparts toward civil rights struggles in their respective countries?
Tutu: Martin Luther King knew that many in America would be appalled and outraged when they saw police attacking defenseless people, nonviolent people, as did Gandhi in India. He knew that in England there would be a [white] constituency that would be morally outraged. But in South Africa we don’t seem to have that moral minimum standard.
Are you saying that white people are insensitive to the sufferings of blacks?
Tutu: I don’t think they get appalled. Shouldn’t they have been appalled by 69 people being killed at Sharpeville? Shouldn’t they be appalled that many hundreds have been killed? Children are being put in jail. Where is the moral outrage?
But many people are appalled.
Tutu: And then do what? It’s nice being appalled in the comfort of your home and feel morally outraged. It’s no skin off your nose. The moral outrage I am talking about is one that makes a government sit up and take notice, like the Vietnam War.
Do you think the multinational companies in South Africa are trying to end apartheid?
Tutu: Well, they have suddenly become a lot more vocal.
Why do you think that is?
Tutu: We are not very suspicious creatures, but we note the coincidence between their sudden awareness of political and social responsibilities, and the step-up overseas in the pace for disinvestment, and the action of those banks which pulled the carpet from under the rand.
Do you think it is a fair comparison when people say that black people in South Africa are materially better off than in countries of northern Africa?
Tutu: People don’t say things that are fair. People say things that score points. The answer is very straightforward: I am not a Mozambiquan. I am not a Zambian. I am not a Nigerian. I am a South African, and I think the fairest comparison is with my fellow South Africans.
Is there any African nation that can serve as a model for South Africa?
Tutu: Botswana is a land regarded as one of the few genuine multiparty democracies. It’s interesting that the world did not notice when [Tanzanian] President [Julius) Nyerere stepped down without any upheaval. If there was a coup in his country, we would not have heard the end of it. It happened also in the Cameroons. These things are not played up, but played down. You only play up the horrible things.
Tribal conflict is a problem in many African nations. People fear that this will happen in South Africa. Can it be avoided?
Tutu: There isn’t any guarantee that I can give. However, people have very short historical memories. There is no tribalism in the United States, but one of the first things that happened after their independence was the Civil War. There’s no tribalism in Northern Ireland, and look what they are doing there. It is the government that has tried to play up tribalism. We do have factional fights, but the people who fight are people who live under very unnatural conditions.
Are you saying that the issue of tribalism in South Africa is not real?
Tutu: I don’t say it’s not possible that large groups that know they have a numerical strength might not try to exploit that. But our history has been one where we have made great play of the fact when people ask what you are, in fact trying to find out what tribe you belong to, people say, “I am an African.”
Can you allay the feelings of many whites who believe one day blacks will take terrible retribution on whites in South Africa?
Tutu: You can’t give them any guarantees, because what guarantee can you give them? Even if you put it into a constitution, whites have shown that even so-called entrenched clauses are not worth the paper on which they are written. I think they have to look at the things that have happened. You had a bloody struggle in Kenya — you had the Mau Mau — and you would have thought that the last place whites would have been able to survive in after independence would be Kenya. Yet Kenya turned out to be one of the most stable places in the world. Look at Zimbabwe. Hasn’t Mr. Mugabe done one of the most extraordinary things in his first government when he appointed two whites to his cabinet? He spoke of the policy of his government as reconciliation, rehabilitation, and reconstruction. Remarkable.
If there was a black government in South Africa, would you still speak out on injustice?
Tutu: I’ve done so. Last year, speaking in Nairobi, I referred to the fact in many African countries there is less freed om than there was in colonial days. I can’t say something is evil because it is perpetrated by whites, then suddenly the same thing is not evil because it is perpetrated by blacks. That is why I do not actually belong to a political organization.
But haven’t you supported the United Democratic Front?
Tutu: I have been a patron of the UDF and been in the National Forum, but basically I think one has to be able to maintain what is called a critical distance, so that you can always say, “Thus says the Lord.”
What do you say to people who claim that you want a Marxist government in South Africa?
Tutu: I am not employed by any political organization. I have no political ambitions. I care about this country and I’m my own master, except that I owe allegiance to Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The things I say are based on his teachings. I have said I do not like capitalism. I would like to see a compassionate sharing, maybe a socialist kind of dispensation.
What is your vision of what you would like South Africa to be like in ten years?
Tutu: In a nutshell, I would like to be able to see a government where P. W. Botha could very well be state president and Nelson Mandela prime minister, and where we can make appointments to government based entirely on ability. It might take some doing. but when we look back we would ask, why were we so crazy for so long? Can you imagine the energies that would be released — energies that are presently locked up either in trying to defend something that is fundamentally undefensible or in opposing that system? Look at all the army units that are in the townships. These are man and woman hours which could be spent far more profitably in other things. People would be living where they could afford to live. There [still] would be the discrimination that came from wealth. education, and culture, but we would be asking, why did we impoverish ourselves so much, and not just materially? Apart from having spent so much money on defense, on police, we have impoverished this country by depressing the black community’s earning capacity and therefore its spending capacity. by artificially low wages which initially appeared cheap, but in the long run proved very expensive.
Does your hope for the future include blacks and whites living side by side?
Tutu: Can you imagine the enrichment that would come to many white people if they had known at close quarters someone like Steve Biko, Albert Luthuli, Robert Sobukwe? What makes a man of that type tick so that after 25 years he can still say he is not prepared to accept release on conditions that are unacceptable to him? What kind of person is that? And we can help to exorcise from one another the things that distort our humanity, because at the present time our humanity is distorted by hatred, animosity. and suspicion.
Yet are you optimistic about the future?
Tutu: As a human being, I just say. “Look at these guys. Do they have any sense at all?” And as a human being. I feel hopeless sometimes. But as a Christian I hold on to the belief that this is God’s world and He is in charge. It may not always seem so. One also believes in the resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and I end up being a prisoner of hope. Sometimes I hold on to that by the skin of my teeth.
As many of you know, less than a decade after this interview with Desmond Tutu, South Africa held its first democratic elections in 1994 with Nelson Mandela emerging victorious after having spent 27 years in prison for opposing apartheid. Desmond Tutu continued his amazing journey for another 35 years leading an exemplary life for us all. As of this writing South Africa remains a constitutional democracy, but as with democracies around the world, however, foundational shifts within that democratic control may be emerging.
